Photo by Towfiqu barbhuiya on Unsplash (illustrative)
On 16 July 2025, the World Bank published its Global Findex 2025 report, its regular global survey of how adults save, borrow and make payments. It found that 79% of adults had a bank or mobile-money account in 2024, up from 74% in 2021 and about half in 2011.
Key facts
In developing economies, 40% of adults saved in a financial account in 2024, up 16 percentage points since 2021, the fastest rise in more than a decade.
Women's account ownership in developing economies nearly doubled, from 37% in 2011 to 73% in 2024.
In Sub-Saharan Africa, account ownership reached 58% of adults, up from 49% in 2021.
About 900 million adults who still lack an account already own a mobile phone.
Why it matters
A safe place to save lets families cope with emergencies, pay school fees and invest in small businesses without keeping cash under the mattress. Much of the progress comes from mobile money, which reaches people far from any bank branch.
Worth noting
About 1.3 billion adults still have no account, and roughly 700 million of them are women. Owning an account does not always mean using it, and in Sub-Saharan Africa women remain 12 percentage points less likely than men to have one.